[Hunpecked]

The Tessellate won AI Deathmatch III, beating the United Flora for AI bragging rights.

In a 2000 point game I'm playing against the AIs, the Tessellate have Advanced Storage, Religious, and Crystallurgy. Their Strength is pathetic, Research and Mining are somewhat enhanced, Aggression is reduced, but Defense is improved. According to Master Belisarius, who ran the Deathmatch, the Tessellate beat the United Flora (another Religious race) by outbuilding and outnumbering them; Tessellate Construction is 120 in my game, and Maintenance is only 10%.

Given time to develop, I'm guessing a high-bonus Tessellate empire could overwhelm a human player with huge fleets of Crystalline-armored ships firing with the supernatural accuracy of the Talisman. I haven't seen that in my game, however, probably because I captured the Tessellate home system early.